There have been a lot of improvements in the multi-display technology; in this slide AMD explains that they are now the first implementing DisplayPort 1.2 and Fast HDMI, along with Stereo 3D (on both DP and HDMI):
Besides the DP 1.2 technology, HDMI 1.4, Stereo 3D, we have now a new display controller engine with the most advanced color correction hardware for consumers:
DDMA can send a separate audio stream to each display, so we can have audio output on all 3 displays at once:
Let's say that currently we are playing a video on our laptop and a secondary display is connected on the left; when we decide to do another activity on the main display and move the video playback window onto the secondary screen, the audio output will also move to that external monitor:
In the case of video conferencing, each person will be only heard into the speakers of the display where they are shown (clearer audio is now possible because of separate audio streams):
Now we have new software features introduced with Catalyst 11.10:
In the near future, some more features will be introduced:
There are multiple monitors available on the market that support the technology:
With the new breed of monitors we can enjoy Fast HDMI:
For the illustration, AMD wants to demonstrate that with older traditional HDMI, we are limited to 24HZ per eye, or 24 cycles per second. We can show along the arrow a timeline, say t = 0 seconds and t = 1 seconds, showing that 24 frames passes in that time (for each eye)? This is ideal for watching Blu-Ray 3D movies, but for gamers that want over 30 frames per second minimum, this isn’t enough.
In the past, we were limited to either 1280 x 720 at 60 Hz, or 1920 x 1080 at 24 Hz. No longer do people have to choose between frame rates and resolution; they can now get the best of both words!